Ojo de Liebre Lagoon

Laguna Ojo de Liebre is a large, shallow salty watery habitat that is wide, long and from in depth. Relatively deep channels cut through the lagoon between its broad intertidal flats. Geology Geological studies indicated that Laguna Ojo de Liebre began as a pocket beach on the coastal plain of Baja California at a time when the ocean was some 12 meters lower than today's level. Tidal changes resulted in the formation of inlets and sediment from nearby river gradually built a barrier to form the lagoon. The Ojo de Liebre lagoon has the biggest saltworks plant in the world – Exportadora de Sal S.A. (ESSA). The company makes salt from seawater which is pumped into concentration ponds measuring 33,000 hectares. The salt plant creates an effluent called bittern (a liquor remaining after salt-boiling) that is discharged into the lagoon. In December 1997, 94 green turtles were found dead weeks after the company discharged bitterns into the lagoon. The bitterns were investigated for fluoride content and were found to contain over 100 mg per liter. ESSA had earlier claimed that the bitterns contained the same salts present as seawater, only more concentrated (20-fold). F− was found to be 60.5 times higher than F− in sea water. ==History==

In December 1857, Charles Melville Scammon, in the brig Boston, accompanied by the schooner-tender Marin, under Lefft, first entered Laguna Ojo de Liebre to hunt the gray whales breeding there. They caught twenty. Scammon returned to the lagoon the next winter (1858–59), this time with the bark Ocean Bird and the schooner-tenders A.M. Simpson and Kate, under Easton and Hale. He caught forty-seven cows, which produced of oil. He was accompanied by six other vessels (five barks and one schooner), which obtained an additional of oil (about 150 whales). A high of eleven vessels visited the lagoon in the winter of 1859-60, but they obtained considerably less oil— (c. 140 whales). Eight vessels (all sent by U.S. merchants, except one: the Russian brig Constantine, under Otto Wilhelm Lindholm) the next season got even less: a little over from about 90 whales. Only a few ships visited the lagoon the following three seasons—in the first season they obtained ; the second ; and in the third only about . When the bark Louisa visited the lagoon in the winter of 1872-73 she only obtained of oil. It was abandoned after that. ==See also==